Classic vehicle enthusiasts have no shortage of options in today’s restoration market; you can get an ECD Defender with Corvette or electric power, a Porsche 911 reimagined by Singer, or one of several vintage builds from Icon 4×4. DrivingOnRoad has been privileged to drive many of these restomod projects from various companies, but our ears still perked up when we offered the chance to drive one from a New Jersey-based builder called Expedition Motor Company.
EMC only builds one product, the Mercedes-Benz G-Class, specifically the 250GD Wolf. Unlike the leather-filled status symbol you’ll get from a Mercedes dealership, the G-Wagen from EMC is built using retired military vehicles, sticking closer to the vehicle’s origins. This is a restomod with an emphasis on “resto.”
When we say that company founder Alex Levin only builds one product, we really mean it. EMC only offers one configuration: a two-door with a soft top powered by the stock five-cylinder diesel engine. Want a four-door? Look elsewhere. Want a hardtop? Look elsewhere. Want a modern V8 with more power? You get the drill. But if you want a vehicle that captures the essence of a classic off-roader, EMC has built it.
What Is A Wolf G-Wagen?
G-Wagens may litter the streets of places like Beverly Hills and Miami, but they were initially designed as bare-bones military vehicles. EMC only uses W461.4 G-Wagens, nicknamed the Wolf, built from 1990 to 1993. ‘Wolf’ G-Wagens are 250GD models with a fold-down window and a soft-top roof. If it doesn’t tick these boxes, it’s not considered a Wolf.
Levin says his insistence on using this particular variant is fueled by many factors, most notably his desire to take retired military vehicles and give them a second life. He says many customers have asked him to restore their civilian vehicles, but he prefers to modify G-Wagens that would otherwise be left to rot in a junkyard. Levin has over 100 G-Wagens that await EMC’s intricate restoration process.
The Restoration Process
Levin says that due to their use as military vehicles, the vehicles he purchases for restoration arrive in various states of disrepair. Since EMC already has donor vehicles in stock, a full restoration takes just four months after the first deposit is received, with nearly 2,000 man-hours going into the build. The truck is taken down to bare metal and then built back up with painstaking detail. EMC cleans, disassembles, and rebuilds the original engine with a refinished block plus new crankshaft seals, cylinder head bolts, timing belt, oil pump, and more. Similar attention is given to the transmission, axles, and frame.
Most of the final build is original, but certain parts are modernized to improve the driving experience. There’s a fresh suspension setup with urethane suspension bushings, new springs, and shock absorbers. The brake calipers are rebuilt with new pads and rotors to bring it to a stop quickly. Modern headlights are installed to provide better visibility at night, and it rides on BF Goodrich K02 All-Terrain tires for off-roading. These pieces all help the Wolf feel a bit more livable without ruining the authenticity. Levin says he also adds a Vintage Air A/C unit, a modern four-speaker stereo with wireless Apple CarPlay, and heated seats.
Build Your Own
EMC is fairly open to customer feedback, so long as it doesn’t interfere with the two-door, original engine, soft-top formula. For example, these Wolf G-Wagens all came with a four-speed manual transmission with a crawler gear, but a request from a disabled veteran prompted EMC to offer a five-speed automatic. This transmission adds a substantial $12,500 to the price, which Levin says is purely at cost after sourcing, installing, and tuning it to his specifications.
Customers can visualize their build on EMC’s impressive online configurator, which features 20 vibrant exterior colors to choose from. “If you’d like another color, send it to us, and we can spray it on panels,” Levin says. The same applies to the interior, where customers can select from a swatch book, or EMC is happy to install any fabric you send in. The list of options is fairly short, including a winch bumper, exterior lights, an external gas canister, steps, a snorkel kit, third-row jump seats, and an automatic transmission. Buyers can also choose the interior wood color, exterior grille color (black or body color), indicator colors (clear or amber), and roof color (black, beige, or red) in ‘bikini’ style or as a full soft top.
DrivingOnRoad had a chance to sample two builds, a White Wolf with Mushroom Vinyl, and a Gulf Blue with Praline Vinyl. No matter which one we were driving, we received tons of stares, a thumbs up, and excited faces.
Back-To-Basic Interior
Aside from the CarPlay head unit and the air conditioning, the EMC Wolf G-Wagen feels like an authentic classic, albeit revived to be better than new. The creature comforts here are minimal; you get wind-up windows, simple gauges that don’t include a tachometer, a leather-wrapped two-spoke steering wheel, an analog clock, and even an original map light that was literally used to read a paper map in the dark.
It may have air conditioning and heated seats, but those are only an attempt to make the interior slightly more bearable in extreme weather. We drove both trucks either with a bikini top or the roof removed entirely on a hot Florida day; naturally, you do have to accept that the elements will play a factor in the temperature. Putting on the full soft top can help, but we didn’t have a chance to drive one with it installed. We also got to drive the G-Wagen with the windscreen folded down, which is a quick process that only requires two latches. Going over 30 mph with the window down seems a bit terrifying, but the breeze in your face feels nice at neighborhood speeds.
A Practical Classic
Getting into the back seats is fairly easy – just pull a lever under the front seats to trigger a tip function. The back seats are surprisingly roomy for a two-door SUV and the Wolf gets heated seats. Both rear chairs have hidden storage underneath, and every Wolf G-Wagen includes an ammunition box that EMC turns into a storage area for trinkets. For $2,000 extra, you can turn the G-Wagen into a six-seater with rear-facing jump seats. Those seats are best reserved for children but it does enable you to bring the whole family along. Getting up into those jump seats may be a little challenging for smaller children, which is why we recommended that EMC offer a kick-down step in the back, which seemed to resonate with Levin when it was brought up.
Driving Impressions: Slow Hilarity
If you’ve ever driven a new-ish Mercedes G-Wagen, throw away everything you think you know about the experience. This is simple motoring, the kind where the driver feels like an integral piece of the puzzle. Let’s start with the engine, a bulletproof 2.5-liter inline-five diesel known as the OM602.930. This engine has a reputation for being unkillable, hence its use in the military, but it’s not exactly potent. It produces just 91 horsepower and 114 lb-ft of torque when new. EMC’s engine restoration process likely pulls these numbers a bit, but the goal wasn’t to make the Wolf any quicker.
Push your foot hard on the throttle, change gears when you sense the engine about to hit its redline (remember, there is no tachometer), and you might get up to 60 mph after around 23 seconds. With so little power on hand, a pedestrian task like merging into traffic becomes an enticing challenge to time accurately and nail each shift perfectly. After spending an hour or so driving it, you begin to assimilate to the lack of a tachometer and learn to change cogs purely on sound and feel. It’s a rewarding feeling to wring every last ounce of momentum out of each gear.
Speaking of the transmission, the manual is pretty different from anything you would find on sale today. It’s a dogleg setup where reverse lives where you’d normally find first. The slot typically occupied by second gear is actually a low-speed crawler gear, meaning first is actually where third usually sits. From there, second is down where fourth would be, third is where fifth would be, and fourth is down and to the right where sixth would be placed. It takes a little getting used to, but is no more challenging to drive than the average stick shift.
Alternatively, EMC can install a five-speed automatic, which we found to be surprisingly well-tuned. Levin says his team painstakingly calibrated the automatic transmission to work with the original diesel engine sans any ECU. That meant programming each shift at various throttle positions to ensure smooth changes in a variety of driving circumstances. The best compliment we can give the automatic is that it feels close to an OEM setup. It tries to seek top gear to maximize efficiency and keep the revs lower, but there is a slight kickdown at the bottom of the throttle that triggers the lowest possible gear when you need to make a pass.
With thin doors and no fixed roof, expect there to be plenty of wind and road noise intruding into the cabin. That being said, we didn’t hear a single squeak or rattle from the bikini top, even when driving over speed bumps, cobblestone roads, and construction zones. We’ve driven comparable products that sound like a rolling kitchen drawer when the roads get bumpy, so the lack of anything similar is a testament to EMC’s build quality. It’s also a testament to the Eibach springs and Bilstein dampers, which soften the ride to the point where speed bumps barely upset the truck. As for the steering, it may not be the most accurate we’ve ever felt, but the hydraulic rack doesn’t require too much effort, nor does it require constant inputs at cruising speeds. We must also compliment the brakes, which deliver excellent feedback and bring the heavy G-Wagen down to a stop in a hurry.
We didn’t have a chance to go off-roading, but the Wolf has some pretty cool four-wheel-drive controls that are easy to engage. A simple lever has four positions: two-wheel-drive, four-wheel-high, a second four-high mode, and four-wheel low. That second four-high mode quickly allows you to put the transfer case into low range without stopping since it’s on a different syncro. That ability to enter four-low on the move is especially helpful when you only have double-digit horsepower and you need to keep up momentum. If four-low still isn’t enough, there are two levers to activate the front and rear locking differentials.
Pricing And Availability
EMC only builds around 24 G-Wagens per year, and Levin says he is perfectly happy keeping his product low volume. The company could easily widen appeal by offering an upgraded engine or other body styles, but that goes against Levin’s ethos. The Wolf G-Wagen from EMC starts at $165,000, which might sound like a huge chunk of change, but this is truly an OEM-level restoration that actually undercuts many more expensive options in this segment.
To commission a new build, EMC requires a 30% up-front deposit, which is followed by a second 30% deposit just as the vehicle enters the painting process. A final 40% payment is due prior to shipping, and this whole process takes around four months, assuming the customer hasn’t added any difficult custom paint or interior options.
Its practical purposes are limited given the lack of power, but as a fun toy, the EMC G-Wagen easily feels worth the asking price. This is a restomod for the enthusiast who values a classic experience, who believes driving a slow car at the limit is more entertaining than using a fraction of an engine’s available power. It’s not for everyone, but those who want a minimalist off-road toy with huge curb appeal are going to love it.